


Offerings to the god of war

by Tereshkova (EarthboundCosmonaut)



Series: Occasional flashes of competence [6]
Category: The Thick of It (TV)
Genre: 2010 is not treating Malcolm well, Gen, Nicola has very middle class taste in sandwiches, TW: depersonalisation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2019-02-25 20:32:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13220685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EarthboundCosmonaut/pseuds/Tereshkova
Summary: He grabs her arm and directs her attention towards the desk. "What is this, Nic'la?""It's an article about anger in men. Have you read it?""What makes you think I'd want to read that?""Because you're a very fucking angry man, Malcolm!"In which Malcolm is stressed and Nicola tries to be a supportive colleague. Rated T for canon-typical language.





	Offerings to the god of war

It takes Malcolm a while to realise what's going on. It starts with food appearing in his office - a croissant in the morning or a sandwich at lunch time. Not every day, but two or three times a week. At first he assumes it's Sam, but when he asks her about it she denies all knowledge. She does bring him meals, but only at his request. He spends too much of his time stalking around Whitehall to have his lunch brought to his office every day.

Then one day, the prosciutto and roasted pepper ciabatta on his desk is accompanied by a copy of the Guardian, open at a feature article about high profile men who have suffered from mental health problems. It includes an interview with Tom, which Malcolm had been forced to arrange after he had been papped entering the offices of a Harley Street psychiatrist. The fact that the PM was openly talking about his experiences of depression had, at least, given Malcolm a reason to ban the hacks from publishing any more rumours about his catastrophic erectile dysfunction. Everyone knew that Prozac stopped you getting it up, and no paper wanted to be seen mocking the PM for mental health problems.

The following week an offering of a tuna Niçoise salad is accompanied by a contact card for the Samaritans. A week later a T2 article on the social pressure on men to sublimate sadness into anger, accompanied by testimonials from several wet rag beta males, is left with a smoked salmon and cream cheese bagel.

It occurs to Malcolm that he's the subject of some kind of _intervention_ , as the congenitally retarded, emotionally incontinent Yanks put it. The list of people in Whitehall who would _want_ to stage an intervention for him is very short. He rules out Sam, and the next name on the list brings him to DoSAC. He checks the Cabinet schedule for the last month and notices a definite correlation between the Secretary of State for Social Affairs and Citizenship's Cabinet appointments and the appearance of these offerings on his desk.

 ***

Nicola is packing up her handbag when he throws a copy of the T2 on her desk. "What the fuck is this?"

She barely glances at it before responding "It's a newspaper."

"Look a bit closer."

"I'm already late for a parent's evening - which I have to get to because obviously James won't be attending and one of us has to give a shit about our children's education."

He grabs her arm and directs her attention towards the desk. "What _is_ this, Nic'la?"

"It's an article about anger in men. Have you read it?"

"What makes you think I want to read that?"

"Because you're a very fucking angry man, Malcolm!" she tells him, glaring directly into his face. "Can I go now?"

"Is it you that's been doing this?" he demands. His greater height forces her to back away from him a step in order to maintain eye contact.

"Doing what?"

"Puttin' food on my desk. Leavin' me fucking newspaper clippings about fuckin' depression and male suicide. Do you think that just because you're mental you can go accusing everyone else of being one coffin short of a fuckin' funeral?"

She yanks her arm free of his grip. "I'm leaving now Malcolm."

He positions himself between her and the door, effectively blocking her exit. "No yer not, not until you've answered me."

Nicola folds her arms, staring him straight in the eye. "Why are you so angry?"

"Because I'm surrounded by fuckin' incompetent morons!"

"Oh yes, you're fine and everyone around you is either incompetent or stupid. That sounds plausible." She shoves him aside - actually physically shoves him! "Goodnight Malcolm."

He's so surprised to be confronted rather than acceded to that he lets her go, waddling in her ridiculous North Face walking trainers.

"I'm no' fuckin' angry!" he shouts at her retreating back.

***

The offerings don't stop. If anything, they step up a gear. The food is now regularly accompanied by newspaper clippings, pamphlets and - on one occasion - a CD of guided breathing exercises. Malcolm ensures that Nicola sees he is using the CD as a coaster the next time he hauls her into his office for a dressing down. Her eyes flash to it momentarily but her expression doesn't waver from indignance at being blamed for a cock up that is - in fairness to her - at least partly down to Ben Swain.

He takes to packing up the leaflets and newspaper cuttings and sending them to her in the internal mail. One day, when he is feeling particularly frustrated, he also includes a half-eaten BLT sandwich - the remnants of yet another meal that has been left on his desk. Two days later he sees the sandwich - now clouded in mould - in the bin in her office. Still the offerings keep coming.

Once or twice he wonders whether maybe he has got it wrong and someone else is behind the food and the wellbeing literature. But if that's the case, why hasn’t Nicola said something, or complained about him sending her rotting food in the internal mail? And who else _would_ it be? No one else in Whitehall is deranged enough to launch such a misguided campaign. No, it has to be her. He contemplates trying to talk to her about it again, but his intestines shrivel at the prospect. Just because the dozy mare's got it into her head that he's a cherry short of a fruitcake, why should he dignify her delusion with any credibility by talking about it? He'll just carry on ignoring her until she gets bored and gives up.

***

The beginning of 2010 is exceptionally busy for Malcolm. The Party is starting to fracture. The public is losing confidence in Tom and factions are forming to unseat him in a desperate attempt to keep the Party in power. The majority has been dwindling with every election and now that the country is in the midst of the worst recession in decades, the public are getting unsettled.

As though keeping the dissidents in line and quelling press speculation about the future of the Party wasn't enough to be getting on with, there are also a series of high profile incidents that Malcolm has to manage. Siobhan from Transport's kinky sex life finally makes the headlines, which results in Malcolm having to persuade her that it's in the best interests of both her and the Government to step down. Planning for the Olympics turns out to be one shambles after another, and to compound the problem the Department for Sport and Creative Industries is subject to yet another accusation of involvement in FIFA corruption. A winter 'flu crisis that sees pictures of grannies lying on trollies in hospital corridors rumbles on for weeks, and Newsnight runs a series of special reports on how the Government's mismanagement of public spending has contributed to the collapse of the financial system.

Malcolm finally comes to the end of his tether during a trip to the superministry to demand to know what exactly - if anything - was going on in the head of the Secretary of State for Local Government and Regional Development when she allowed herself to be overheard commenting on how uncultured Northerners are during a visit to a community arts centre in Wigan. He hijacks Tabitha (what the hell kind of name is Tabitha, anyway? It sounds like a cat) on her way back from a Cabinet meeting and doesn't even allow her to return to her office. He lays into her outside the lifts, his eruption of expletives echoing through the open atrium like a thunderstorm unleashed from Olympus by an angry god.

“Christ alive, my left toenail would be a more effective Cabinet minister than you! I should cut you into little pieces, bake them into vol au vents with a creamy mushroom sauce and serve them at the next policy launch. At least then you'd actually be endearin' us to the electorate instead of pullin' down yer skirt and offering the hacks a fuckin' bullseye to shoot at! How the fuck did you no' realise that you were still wearing a mike? Did yeh think it was some kind of workin' class Northern jewellery, made by child labourers in the fuckin' _steam mill_?"

As he goes on he finds that he's not so much delivering the bollocking as standing slightly outside of his body watching it flow out of him. He sees Tabitha backing away from him in mute horror and notes that his body is quaking with rage, but he feels detached. He starts to lose track of the words. They fade into a babble in his ears and he begins to wonder whether he is having a stroke, because he can't feel his hands. Or his legs. Or his tongue.

He's jerked back into awareness by a pair of hands gripping his face. He feels it as though through cotton wool, but the unexpected sensation gives him something to focus on. "Malcolm. Malcolm! Look at me."

He fights to regain control of his eyes. When he does, he looks down to see Nicola Murray gazing at him, her green eyes intense. "You need to breathe."

He can't. He can't move his body. He feels his lungs burning, but he can't remember how to do it. Nicola takes his hand and places it on her sternum, and then places her own hand on his, her other hand gripping his shoulder. "Come on, we'll do it together. Breathe out." She exhales deeply, her chest sinking under his palm. He feels her warm hand on his own chest, applying firm pressure.

He focuses on that hand, trying to relax the rigid muscles she is pushing against. His ribs contract, air flowing out of him like a pair of crackling bellows.

"Good, that's good. Now breathe in." Her chest rises beneath his hand, and the pressure of her hand on his own chest lightens. 

With immense concentration he breathes in, willing his lungs to fill with air. It comes with a loud gasp.

"Well done. Now let's count. Out for three. One…two…three. Very good. And in - one…two…three."

She stands there breathing with him until he settles back into his body. He feels dazed and disoriented, but has regained enough awareness to notice that he is standing in the lobby of a public building. And that his hand is about two inches above Nicola Murray's left breast. He snatches it away hurriedly.

"Better?" asks Nicola, lowering her hands.

He nods. "Aye." He looks around to see that they are alone on the landing. "Where is everyone?"

"I sent them away. I thought you might like some privacy."

He is shaking. He leans against the wall by the lift in case his legs betray him. "Wha' happened?"

"I don't know. I was coming up the stairs. I could hear you shouting at Tabitha, and then you just seemed to fade out. You were hyperventilating."

"How did yeh know what to do?"

The corner of Nicola's mouth quirks up. "It may surprise you to know that I have some experience of panic attacks."

"I didn't have a panic attack! Unlike you I'm not fuckin' mental."

She accepts his insult calmly. In fact, she is as calm as he's ever seen her. He finds her presence soothing. "You're stressed Malcolm. Your body's telling you that you need to take better care of yourself."

He rubs his hand over his face. It's true that he's stressed. He's running on about three hours sleep a night and a diet of coffee and Monster Munch. And the sandwiches that Nicola has been leaving in his office. That is, the ones he hasn't sent back to her as mouldy internal mail packages. Christ he can be a vindictive little prick sometimes.

"Why don't we go and get some fresh air?" Nicola suggests. "You could do with getting out of the office for a while."

He complies because he has no fucking idea what else to do. They walk to St James' Park. Nicola buys cappuccinos from a kiosk and they sit on a bench by the lake. She talks at him - a gentle prattle about nothing much that gives him space to regroup. He focuses on the sensation of the cool air passing through his lips and the warmth of the coffee cup under his fingertips, and gradually starts to feel as though he belongs to his body again.

Eventually when she pauses he says "I know it's you that's been leaving all tha' stuff in my office."

She nods. "I'm worried about you. I have been since the Christmas party."

He chuckles mirthlessly. "You're worried about _me_? You're the one that knocked on the head by her husband and lost her fuckin' _shoes_."

"Things are getting on top of you Malcolm, and the longer you avoid acknowledging that the harder you're going to find it to cope. Trust me - I've been there."

It's difficult to imagine Nicola being more flaky than she is at the moment, but in fairness to her she was by all accounts quite a competent MP before she was promoted to the Cabinet. He feels a small twinge of guilt. Nicola harbours very little personal ambition - she wouldn't be in this post if he hadn't propelled her into it.

"Have you thought about talking to someone?"

"And do what? Lie on a fuckin' couch and pay £100 an hour to tell some headshrinker all about my childhood? I'd sooner spend the money on whisky - at least I'd enjoy that."

"Not all therapy's like that. You could look at something like CBT - short, targeted stuff to teach you coping techniques."

"I don't need fuckin' coping techniques Nic'la. I've made it to fifty, I think I know how to look after myself."

"Okay, fine. How about the next time you start to feel like you want to explode, you call me and we have a cup of coffee by the lake?"

He turns to look at her. Her expression is utterly sincere. "Wha' if it's you that I'm bollocking at the time?"

"Well in that case I'll send Terri to have a coffee with you instead."

He laughs - a genuine laugh this time. "I'd rather eat my own entrails."

Nicola grins back at him. "Maybe you should bollock me less then."

"Can't do that. Yeh'd bring down the fuckin' Government if I left you unsupervised."

"Just call me if you need to, Malcolm," she tells him, placing a solemn hand on his arm. "You've got a lonely job. Even you need a friend sometimes."

***

The sandwiches continue but she lets up on the literature. Malcolm stops posting rotten food to her in the internal mail and a few times he does call her. They go to the park and feed the ducks and talk about inconsequential things - TV shows, recipes and their mutual hatred of Piers Morgan. Somehow, Malcolm finds he feels calmer after these walks. He'll never admit this to Nicola though.


End file.
